Last Saturday night saw the Egg’s Hart Theater packed to the
brim with very excited women. Grinning women, singing women,
dancing women. Hooting women, clapping women, whooping women.
There were a few guys in attendance, and they were excited
too, but my God, the female audience members were just overjoyed
to be there. In a rare moment of calm, a woman a row in front
of me poked her companion in the shoulder repeatedly, hissing,
“Can you believe we’re actually here? I’m so psyched!”

Yes, ladies and gentlemen (but mostly ladies): This hullabaloo
was all due to the main Saturday event. The Indigo Girls were
in town.

Emily Saliers and Amy Ray have performed their brand of Southern,
bluegrass-inflected folk rock for more than two decades, and
if Saturday was any indication, these girls have been creating
hubbubs all over the place. Saliers (the blonde one) sports
a bright, melodic voice while Ray (the brunette) possesses
moodier, deeper vocals. Together, they produce heart- stopping
harmonies that showcase their smart, meticulously crafted
songwriting.

On Saturday, the Atlanta-based duo took the stage looking
more punk than folk with ripped jeans and T-shirts, and opened
with 2004’s “Fill It Up Again,” a newer tune but a crowd-pleaser
nonetheless. They followed up with “Get Out the Map,” “Thin
Line,” and then one of their super-popular love songs, “Power
of Two.”

“All
That We Let In,” a beautiful finger-picked ballad of love,
loss and politics, off 2004’s album of the same name, was
a high point of the set, its lyrics as poignant as ever: “One
day those toughies will be withered up and bent/The father,
son and the holy warriors and the president/The glory days
of put up dukes for all the world to see/Beaten into submission
in the name of the free.”

Another great bit of political commentary came when Amy Ray
sang the lyrically biting, anthemic “Let it Ring” off her
2005 solo record, Prom.

The Girls changed out guitars on practically every song; on
occasion they would trade in their 12- and 6-strings for a
banjo and mandolin.

And so it went—two hours of nonstop (with the exception of
the presence of an unacceptable harmonica that made Ray stop
in her tracks for a minute during “Dairy Queen”) stripped-down
performance with drop-ins by the Girls’ bus driver/keyboard
player Rick, and opening act Three5Human, who also stayed
through the raucous three-song encore, which was, appropriately,
ended with “Midnight Train to Georgia.”

While the Girls covered their canon of hits pretty thoroughly—including
“Ghost,” “Galileo,” and the Grammy-winning “Closer to Fine”—the
early ’90s success “Least Complicated” was notably absent
from the setlist.

It’s really a pleasure to witness the Indigo Girls’ live performances;
their tunes are infused with much more energy than on any
studio album I’ve heard by them. Live, Ray and Saliers are
able to stretch and show off their voices. The aforementioned
audience reaction at the Egg’s Hart Theater didn’t hurt things
at all either. Fans were singing and dancing, swaying and
hooting. I was pretty sure they were going to rush the stage,
but they were able to maintain control. Somewhat.

Openers Three5Human—a four-piece rock outfit also hailing
from Atlanta—boasted the phenomenal lead vocals of Trina Meade,
whom the Indigo Girls said they knew for years—once upon a
time, they were in a production of Jesus Christ Superstar
together in Atlanta. Three5Human gave a soulful, vigorous
performance of pure soul rock that the audience absolutely
ate up.

Joy
Finds a Way

David Bromberg

The
Egg, Feb. 10

If
David Bromberg looks like anything these days, it’s a mild-mannered
literature professor. At the Egg, it was evident that the
keen wolfishness of his ’70s heyday had evolved into a sort
of genteel, dusty-gray and benign middle age (complete with
khaki slacks belted high around an ample waist).

Appearances aside, Bromberg was far from toothless when it
came to performing: He hit the stage at the Hart Theater in
full musical stride with his band on Friday night, rolling
out his eclectically inventive yet historically potent brand
of roots music. (And remember: This is a performer who—beyond
his own impressive songwriting history—has backed Bob Dylan
and cowritten with George Harrison.)

The Hart Theater was packed to the gills with the typical
Brombergian audience: baby boomered, ideologically a bit left
of center, with a whole lot of gray-bearded heads bopping
in unison.

Bromberg—switching between acoustic guitar, electric guitar,
and violin—joked at one point that the wheeling, diversely
influenced instrumental “Midnight on the Water” was “a sobriety
test” for him and his band. They passed muster in style though,
with mandolinist Mitch Corbin and violinist Jeff Wisor particularly
shining.

Live, Bromberg’s music is a kind of pan-Atlantic folk—and
that barely contains the lot of it. His three-man horn section
was a sort of rogues gallery of diverse personalities and
shapes, from the lean, ascetic Scandinavian Zen of trumpet
player Peter Ecklund (who barely seemed to register a pulse
when not blowing) to slide trombonist Curt Linberg (gregariously
squat and white-bearded) to bald-pated hipster John Firmin
(on clarinet, sax, and pennywhistle). The trio added rapturous
New Orleans blasts even to such dusty Americana traditionals
as “Make Me a Pallete on the Floor” or “Don’t Let Your Deal
Go Down.” It was a striking combination, cutting gleefully
against the bluegrass and folk strains. At times, the band
even lilted full tilt into breathtaking, penny-whistle-laced
Celtic workouts.

Also particularly impressive was the rhythm section of Butch
Amiot and Richard Crooks, who stitched a tight, sturdy pocket
around which everything else unfolded.

Bromberg’s range throughout the night veered between mighty
acoustic folk workouts and bluesily existential barroom rumination.
But the secret, whether sailing on the bright blasts of the
horn section or merely riding the waves of Bromberg’s youthful
vigor, was that joy could find expression even in music’s
deepest, darkest moments. It was a spirited night of music.